Instead you would have a deep and open virtual world where the developers give the players the tools to create certain aspects of  the atmosphere, lore, story, world and external objects and creations within the virtual world.

Just as an example, sort of like a more open version of Ultima Online and Neverwinter Nights.

A game world needs some lore and some backstory.    This is what helps to define the world the characters adventure in.   The world needs a soul of some kind.

 Except you would just end up with a game that five years down the line still had no story and no lore. Any attempts by RP groups to actually inject any into the game would be firmly squished by stat whores and people so dead set on keeping the game based on "skillz" and competitive that it would never really emerge even if players were given the tools. Besides, this is really only entertaining if you're the kind of person who likes to DM a D&D event. Most people would rather enjoy a good story set before them than have to constantly build it up/hamfist things together all the time. 

You are right about one thing though. At the rate things are going, MMORPGs are going to end up with absolutely no story/lore as focus on gear/stats/leaderboards just climbs ever higher. There's a reason the genre has slowly turned to the suck. 

Originally posted by Teala

A game world needs some lore and some backstory.    This is what helps to define the world the characters adventure in.   The world needs a soul of some kind.

The players would be invovled in the creation of that Soul.

I think such a game could very special. But It seems like everyone wants to attack any unique and original idea and complain about the current crop of boringly designed MMORPG's.

If you go looking for flaws, you'll find them in anything. Flaws exist in everything just as a fire is surrounded by smoke.

Originally posted by GlowingMoon

Originally posted by Teala

A game world needs some lore and some backstory.    This is what helps to define the world the characters adventure in.   The world needs a soul of some kind.

 

The players would be invovled in the creation of that Soul.

I think such a game could very special. But It seems like everyone wants to attack any unique and original idea and complain about the current crop of boringly designed MMORPG's.

If you go looking for flaws, you'll find them in anything. Flaws exist in everything just as a fire is surrounded by smoke.

I think you could have both.  Give it a backstory as a foundation and then let the players create the history of the world from that point on.  But for that you would need an extremely dynamic sandbox game and (I think) a game not based on character progression (which inevitably makes a mess of trying to maintain a persistant world that makes sense).

So don't expect it to happen in the next 40 or 50 years.  We'll have to wait untill the WoW generation starts dying out before there is any real hope and unfortunately I'll be dead before they are.

Originally posted by Teala

A game world needs some lore and some backstory.    This is what helps to define the world the characters adventure in.   The world needs a soul of some kind.

I agree fully. Otherwise it would just be a bunch of people existing in a bland environment. The game also needs things to do (perferably no grind).

In most games, the story and lore means nothing, it has no direct impact on gameplay, it's just something that's there that makes no difference.  If it just went away, I'd have no problem with it in most games because it doesn't mean anything now.

It might be interesting if someone came up with a story that was integral to gameplay but I just don't see that happening any time soon.

Sandbox games like EVE and Darkfall have backstories and a setup.  Without any story or lore, there's no base to launch from, especially if you expect players to generate lore?  Please, 98% of the people I run into in any MMO I've played (even on RP servers) aren't interested in crafting an entire story outside of their own character.  If you want to create your own lore or story, just start RPing in your game of choice, or become a game developer.

I play games because I honestly want to experience someone else's world, if I had to do everything myself, I'd be completely turned off.  Sandbox games with a backstory at least give me some sort of direction, but I only have to work on the story of my individual character, hell no am I going to create for other people.

Originally posted by GlowingMoon

Instead you would have a deep and open virtual world where the developers give the players the tools to create certain aspects of  the atmosphere, lore, story, world and external objects and creations within the virtual world.

Just as an example, sort of like a more open version of Ultima Online and Neverwinter Nights.

Just go buy "The Sims" if thats all you want.

To me, this sounds like a bland and uninteresting game. 

If we are to take you title seriously and create a game with -no- backstory and -no- existing lore, what would it be about?  What would the players face in terms of opponents?  Why would the players even need to be present?  Assuming there is no story whatsoever, there would be no conflict within the game world, save for that which the players created.

Which brings me to my second point.  Player-made content and plots tend to be unreliable, at best.  At worst, they often conflict with each other and make it impossible to become immersed in the game.

Originally posted by GlowingMoon

Instead you would have a deep and open virtual world where the developers give the players the tools to create certain aspects of  the atmosphere, lore, story, world and external objects and creations within the virtual world.

Just as an example, sort of like a more open version of Ultima Online and Neverwinter Nights.

A well-written pre-existing lore is a very important aspect of a virtual world, imo.

If I read about a legendary hero defeating a legendary villain in a scary castle, it makes me want to visit that scary castle and see for myself where that battle happened. It's going for a look at the Sarlacc in SWG, or stumbling upon an abandoned escape pod in the sands of Tattooine and realising that it's the one that C3PO and R2D2 landed in.

Evolving lore appeals to me; i.e. developers making changes to the game based on the actions of players. Like the "kill 50 rookery whelps within 15 seconds to get the "Jenkins" title" as an homage to the legendary Leroy Jenkins, or the "More Dots!" and "Many whelps! Handle it!".. both references to a well-known video/chat recording.

yes, because that's reality. In the real world there is no history or lore. People don't have a story to tell... we're all created as adults with no background.

/s

Besides, fan based or player based story/lore ALWAYS sucks.

I'm more or less talking about a more open version of something along the lines of Neverwinter Nights as an MMORPG. Which I did say in my original post.

Most of you who have been very vocal in this thread do not seem to like this idea, well then go ahead and play your World of Warcrafts, Everquest 2's etc. Just because your not keen on an idea like this doesn't make It wrong, and also I don't think your grapsing or seeing the exact concept of what I'm talking about.

It's not that you couldn't have some base races or a world with nature and different monsters / creatures. It's just that the majority of content and certain aspects of the game world would be player driven and player created. Games such as Neverwinter nights and the module community of It have proven that there is a strong player base for this type of game, and that there are many people who are willing to and enjoy creating content.

Some people, such as myself like a vast variety of unique and different content  with lots of contrast. Even If at times that means there could be possible clashing, It's something I'm personally okay with. Even though some of you who have been vocal in this thread may not be, but that's okay.

Just don't go trying to crush an Idea that is something different and interesting to me and many other players just because It doesn't fit your exact preference and style of what you think a game should be.
 

To me the lore and history is a critical element to the immersion. When I was Beta testing Vanguard it felt very much like a world with no story or history, it felt very lacking. I can understand the concept of allowing players to crate a world with History, however its far more complex and to get people to agree on its structure could be daunting.

You only have to read this thread to see how views and opinions differ, now imagine creating a game where players are to decide the backgrounds of a game world.

You seem to be quite enamored with neverwinter nights.  Unfortunately, neverwinter nights did have a good deal of background information and, yes, lore. 

Players could certainly design their own worlds and settings, but this was due to the fact that NWN wasn't an mmo.  Instead, it was designed around modules.  A player's actions in one module had no bearing on another game or setting.  One setting might have a race described as brutal and bloodthirsty, while another would describe them as peaceful and noble.  This was possible because these two worlds would never collide with one another. 

In an mmo, however, collision is inevitable.  The concept of an mmo revolves around several players participating in a shared game world.  If you rely on players to fill in the background of that world, you are bound to encounter all sorts of issues.  For example, let us say there is a ruined keep in the woods behind a city.  One player may create an account of the keep's history.  Shortly thereafter, a second player does the same, giving an entirely different version of how the keep came to be.  Who is to be believed?  What should the player take as 'official'?

The most common response to this dilemma is: Who cares? 

Now, take that response and apply it to ever aspect of a game world.  Immersion quickly falls apart, and a mediocre, if not outright horrible game results.

Players can be pretty bad at creating their own lore and stories.  It would have to be heavily moderated by the community but I think its always possible.  You cant expect players to create their own art, ect though, so what do you expect them to create?  And how do you prevent them from making their maps too easy to beat?  Everyone would eventually just play whatever gets them the most goodies the fastest, and so all the map creators would be trying to give people the goodies!

Play content is 99% absolute crap.
Most of the keeners are absolutely terrible when it comes to creating anything meaningful.

If you want some hope, look into research projects such as PaSSAGE, which are attempts to procedurally improve player agency. I think you're gona to see that making its way into the mainstream soon enough.

But Writing procedural stories is something nobody has actually pulled off... were not even sure its doable.

Originally posted by wormywyrm

.  You cant expect players to create their own art, ect though, so what do you expect them to create? 

You could have a model creator similar to Spore ( The concept of Spore's model creator, not the actual visual models in It, something more suited to fantasy of course ) that is intuitive and simple to use.

So...I'd be creating a background for my character, the world, my own quests, designing a majority of the playable world...

Isn't that what I'm paying a subscription fee for?

Originally posted by Loricane

So...I'd be creating a background for my character, the world, my own quests, designing a majority of the playable world...

Isn't that what I'm paying a subscription fee for?

Pretty much.  In DDO, there's a place you can fill in your character's background, but it's all pointless and has no impact whatsoever on the actual gameplay.  Most players would make their characters horribly unrealistic anyhow, how many "lost princes" do we need?